Sunday, September 18th
Sunday evening as I was relaxing on the couch before bed, I noticed that Pepper was way more active than usual. She was almost always super mellow in the womb, doing a lot more stretching than kicking. But that evening she was dancing away--perhaps a farewell to the uterus party?
Monday, September 19th
On Monday morning around 7:00, I lost my mucus plug and had some bloody show. This was exciting because it could mean that labor would be starting soon, but at the same time, could also mean that it may be days or a week away from starting. Since I would be 39 weeks pregnant on Tuesday, this really didn't give me any information that I didn't already know, but it was reassuring to see that my body was continuing to prepare for labor (I had been having more frequent and more uncomfortable Braxton-Hicks contractions over the last week). Luckily I had the foresight to grab some pads before heading out the door to work.
Around 10:00am, I stood up from my desk to go the the bathroom, and felt a tiny little gush. Now, that sensation is not totally unusual for a late-pregnancy change of position, so I didn't think a whole lot of it, other than to note that the color was clear, and that I hadn't peed my pants! Throughout the rest of the day, every time I would change positions, I'd get more little gushes. Never a whole lot of fluid, but definitely noticeable. I started to think "hmmm... I wonder..." and promptly googled variations of "amniotic fluid color and consistency" and "how do I know if my amniotic fluid is leaking." The results of my search compared to my symptoms were inconclusive. It seemed to be behaving like a fluid leak, but the consistency was wrong. I wasn't having any contractions, or any other signals that things were progressing in a non-ordinary fashion, so I told myself that I was probably over-analyzing a very normal late pregnancy thing. When Todd checked in with me over the lunch hour to see if anything was happening (he knew about the mucus plug loss & bloody show that morning) I told him that all was well.
As the afternoon progressed, I became more convinced that I was probably leaking a little bit of amniotic fluid. But I didn't want to be one of "those" women who calls the doc at every little twinge with a false alarm, and I knew that the fact that contractions hadn't started yet was a sign that my body wasn't responding if my water had broken, which meant that the midwife would start talking about induction with pitocin. I had two hopes for this labor & delivery: that my body would go into labor on its own without medication, and that my milk would come in without medication. With Nathan, my water broke and my body did not react (no contractions, no dilation, no effacement, he was not engaged in my pelvis) which resulted in a pitocin induction, two days of painful med-free laboring and a traumatic delivery, followed by my milk not coming in and the need to take medication to make that happen as well. So, I was reluctant to start any induction talk this time around.
When I got home from work, I told Todd that I suspected leakage, and that if my water actually was leaking, which I wasn't sure of, that the baby would have to be coming soon. I was still telling myself that it was no big deal, and probably not happening, and so was pretty non-alarmist about it when telling Todd about it, which I think was kind of confusing for him. He's said that he's not really cut out for the whole "this might be it, this might not be, could be happening soon, might be happening in a week" way of approaching labor. While it was definitely more dramatic and unexpected, he said he was much better with the whole "Babe, I know I'm only 36 weeks along but my water broke in a huge gush" announcement that he received from me with Nathan.
Around 7:00pm, I had a real, live contraction, that was definitely different from the Braxton-Hicks that I'd been having--it was a big gradual wave that was painful at the peak. I told Todd about it, and said that it could mean the baby was coming soon. We reviewed that we were supposed to call the midwife when the contractions were regularly coming at 3-4 minutes apart and I couldn't talk through them. We then went about our normal bedtime routine with Nathan and our evening routine of relaxing on the couch. I had a few more contractions as we went about this, but not ever close together.
We headed to bed, me in our room, and Todd to the guest room, where he had been sleeping for the last week so that I could get some sleep in between my hourly trips to the restroom. For the rest of the night, I had contractions that were real, but never settled into a pattern: 15 minutes apart, 10, 20, hour, 15, etc. They were just close enough that I didn't really get any sleep and that I knew I should call the midwife in the morning and find out for sure whether or not my water really had broken.
Tuesday, September 20th
By Tuesday morning, my contractions had totally petered out, and I was once again second-guessing whether or not the baby was coming soon. I decided that I was going to call in sick to work--if it was the real thing I didn't want to go into the office, and if it wasn't the real thing, I really needed to catch up on the sleep that I didn't get the night before. I asked Todd to take Nathan to daycare, and told him that he should go into work, as it was probably a false alarm, and at the very least he could get some loose ends tied up if it did turn out to be the real thing. So he and Nay left the house with the agreement that I would keep him immediately informed about what the midwife said and any other symptoms.
I called the midwife's office, and was given a 9:45am appointment time to see if my water had broken. By the time I got to the office, I wasn't really leaking anything and hadn't had a contraction in a few hours, so I was pretty convinced that it was a false alarm, and feeling a bit silly about being there. When the midwife, Heather, examined me, her first reaction was "Huh!" Needless to say, that wasn't the most reassuring thing to hear from someone examining your lady bits! It turned out that Heather also wasn't sure whether or not my membranes had ruptured--the fluid was really watery but had a lot of mucus in it, which was making the test results inconclusive. She decided to check me, and could not feel any membranes, and determined that I was 4cm dilated, 90% effaced, and the baby was at -1 station. So those contractions I had overnight definitely did some good work! Heather wanted to make certain that her suspicion that my membranes had ruptured was correct, so she decided to look at a swab under the microscope while I had an ultrasound to measure my current amniotic fluid level and make sure that the baby was still happy in there. Our little Pepper was perfectly content, with a heartbeat of 144bpm and no signs of distress. However, I had a third of the amniotic fluid that I'd had last week--my water had definitely broken!
When Heather heard the results of the ultrasound she told me, "Guess what? You're going to have a baby today!" Ack!! Even though it was absolutely no surprise that I was going to have a baby, and soon, it still caused a sense of panic to hear that she was coming TODAY. The less welcome, but not particularly surprising, bit of news was that since at this point my water had been broken for over 24 hours without my body going into labor on its own, that I would need to be given pitocin to get things going. After 24 hours of burst membranes, the risk of infection for the baby and for me goes up every hour, so the midwife was not at all comfortable with waiting longer for my body to kick in to action on its own. Upon hearing this I started crying, as avoiding pitocin and having a natural labor experience was my top wish, and it wasn't going to happen. Heather was great, very reassuring and validated my feelings, but was firm in her recommendation, and said that with my dilation and effacement that it probably wouldn't take more than a hint of pitocin to kick my body into action. I did not disagree at all with her decision, but was pretty disappointed about it. She told me to go ahead and go on upstairs to labor and delivery. Eek! I asked if I needed to go directly there, and she asked, "Why, is there something you need from home?" I responded that the most important thing I needed was my husband! So she told me to go home, but to be back at the hospital in an hour if possible.
I called Todd and told him that it was go time! He quickly hopped in the car and headed back to Kalamazoo, while making arrangements with his dad to pick Nathan up from daycare that evening. I called my mom to let her know what was going on. At home we gathered last minute items, I ate a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, and we headed to the hospital. As we pulled in, both Todd and I were hoping that today really would be Pepper's birthday--we were prepared for a long labor, as Nathan's pitocin induction was quite the marathon.
They were expecting us in Labor & Delivery; we got checked into our room and I was hooked up to the monitor for 45 minutes or so to monitor the baby and see if I was having any contractions. We settled in and enjoyed the beautiful view of the Kalamazoo Valley from our window. It was a gorgeous, sunny day and it was lovely to have a whole panorama of windows to enjoy it.
The last picture with Pepper on the inside--relaxing in the hospital bed while getting monitored.
The view from our window--it's hard to see in this picture, but we could see Stetson Chapel and East Hall (WMU) from the window. So pretty!
At 1:30 in the afternoon, the nurse came in and started the pitocin drip. I was all of the sudden overcome with nerves and fear--I had been on pitocin before, and knew how hard it was. Also, I had now experienced some natural contractions and learned how much easier it was to get into a mental space to manage the pain when your body gave you an indication that the contraction was on its way, which does not happen with pitocin contractions--those puppies hit you at the peak and then work their way down.
Pretty quickly, the contractions kicked in, and were frequent and intense. The midwife had been right--it didn't take much to get things moving. I worked through the contractions for awhile and then decided to get into the tub to try and manage the pain better that way. Every contraction that came sent a shoot of panic through me that I had to work my way down from. After awhile, still anticipating that I had many more hours of labor to go, I decided that I didn't have anything to prove to myself or anyone else--I had already done the two days of labor on pitocin with no pain medication with Nathan, and I didn't want to do it again. After making sure that Todd was totally supportive of the decision, I decided to get an epidural.
At 3:30pm, the anesthesiologist came in to administer the epidural. The midwife on call, Brandi (who I really, really like) checked me at that point, and I was 6cm, fully effaced, and the baby was at +1 station. She told us that she thought things would progress pretty quickly, and that once I started pushing, she predicted that delivery wouldn't take long. Todd and I didn't believe her! Brandi also commented that she thought the baby had a LOT of hair!
Once the epidural kicked in, the contractions were so much easier to manage. There was one strip above my right hip that didn't go numb, so I could still feel each contraction and had to work through it, but it was very manageable. I could also still feel my pelvis, so I could feel the baby moving down lower. Our midwife, Brandi, spent a lot of time with us, just hanging out and chatting. We really like her, and it was a very relaxed and calm atmosphere. I was lying on my left side a lot of the time so that between contractions I could look out the windows and soak in the sunshine and blue sky. It was so nice to be able to relax completely and rest between contractions.
Around 4:45, Brandi asked if she could check me again, as she noticed that I was working quite a bit harder during each contraction. Sure enough, I was at 9cm! Brandi said she didn't think it would be much longer before I was ready to push, and that the baby would be here soon. She asked our nurse, Whitney, to start getting things set up for delivery. Todd and I still felt that this was crazy--there was no way that the baby was going to be here before the middle of the night!
At 5:15, I told Brandi that I felt like pushing. She checked me again, and agreed--I was at 10cm! With the next contraction I began the process of pushing. Somehow, even though it was a lot of work, I still felt really peaceful and calm. The sun was shining, Todd was right next to me, and the only other people in the room were Brandi and Whitney. Everyone was quietly encouraging, and just letting me do my thing. Pretty quickly, I was able to catch a glimpse of her head (there was a mirror angled so that I could see what was going on "down there"). Seeing that she was on her way was SO motivating! A few more pushes and she crowned! I had to wait between contractions with her head part of the way out, which made it uncomfortable (duh!) and really hard not to push, but allowed my body to stretch just a little bit more on its own. With the next contraction, at 5:34pm, after only 20 minutes of pushing, Natalie was born! They placed her on my chest, and I heard her first cries--the most beautiful sound in the world! She cried just long and heartily enough to let us know that her lungs were working great, and then she calmed down and just looked around quietly and peacefully. Her APGAR scores were 8,9. When the cord stopped pulsing, Todd got to cut it.
Natalie was on my chest for about an hour, and during that time we were able to get her latched on to my breast for a little bit. She was instantly at home there! :) Finally I was willing to share her a little bit, and the nurse weighed and measured her: 7lbs even, 20 inches long, and a 13.5" head circumference. Then Todd got to hold her for the first time. The surge of love that I feel for Todd when seeing him meet his baby for the first time (with Nathan and with Natalie) is almost overwhelming. He is such an amazing dad. And, just like that, we have become a family of four!
Meeting my daughter for the first time.
Natalie Florence Fowle!
7 pounds, and lots of hair!
Meeting Daddy
2 comments:
I can't wait to meet her!
ohh, wonderful! I read the whole thing and got a little tear at the end. Congratulations on your beautiful girl.
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